forwarded from Page 2, where Tom posted:Thismay reflect the reality of our current situation, but I sure as hell don't have to like it. I've never seen an empire that didn't eventually end up with some totalitarian dungsack for an emperor.

[Quoted from the article]

"People are now coming out of the closet on the word 'empire,'" said the conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer. "The fact is no country has been as dominant culturally, economically, technologically and militarily in the history of the world since the Roman Empire."

That's the benign version, whereas what follows is a fine example of why "imperialism" is a dirty word:

Calling for the military occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq, Boot cited the stabilizing effect of 19th-century British rule in the region. "Afghanistan and other troubled lands today," he wrote, "cry out for the sort of enlightened foreign administration once provided by self-confident Englishmen in jodphurs and pith helmets."

But here's the crux of it: it's a metaphor, albeit a useful one:

..."Our future leaders could do worse than be praised for their tenacity, their penetrating intellects and their ability to bring prosperity to distant parts of the world under America's soft imperial influence," Kaplan writes. "The more successful our foreign policy, the more leverage America will have in the world. Thus, the more likely that future historians will look back on 21st-century United States as an empire as well as a republic, however different from that of Rome and every other empire throughout history."



Today, the empire scholars acknowledge that America tends to operate not through brute force but through economic, cultural and political means. The idea seems to be that it is easier to turn other people into Americans than for Americans to make war on them.

"We are an attractive empire," Boot said. And that, empire enthusiasts say, is the reason to root for a Pax Americana. In an anarchic world, with rogue states and terrorist cells, a globally dominant United States offers the best hope for peace and stability, they argue.

"There's a positive side to empire," Kaplan said. "It's in some ways the most benign form of order."



As in, "New World Order"? What amazes me is that anyone with an awareness of geopolitical evolution since World War Two is surprised by this. Tom, it not only reflects the current situation but (again, in its metaphoric way) culminates the Camelot Dreams of the Kennedy Era, whose main faults were only that they came too early and had too strong an adversary.

A lot of us here may also remember The Ugly American (one of whose authors also wrote Fail Safe, another 60s icon). There are ways to avoid the appelation "ugly" while successfully establishing order: it's a matter of attitude. As long as we avoid the "white man's burden" paternalism of the British Empire, allow self-determination without prejudice among national groups - i.e., let them make their own mistakes, as long as they don't endanger themselves or others - and otherwise behave as if we believe what we say we do, freedom, democracy and regulated capitalism will eventually pervade the planet by dint of their preferability.

Meanwhile, I wouldn't worry too much about imperial despots. Nixon tried that, and was defeated by America's greatest hero: The Constitution.

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